Controversial Ingredients: Parabens and Mineral Oil

Parabens are the new mineral oil.  Highly functional and necessary in most skin care products, fully approved by the FDA, and assumed by many to be dangerous.  You’ll find lots of people out there going crazy trying to find products without parabens that have as high a quality and do just as much as the products that do have them.  Good luck finding a product with no parabens that has a decent shelf life, gang!

Are they dangerous in skin care products?  Of course not!  Someone reads an article about eating large quantities of mineral oil (dangerous!) and makes the assumption jump that purified forms of it in facial skin care products are dangerous too.  One of my fellow skin care sales directors relates it to mouth wash.  Is mouth wash dangerous?  No.  It causes long term damage to the eye and severe eye burning when used as eye drops- does that mean we shouldn’t rinse our mouth with it?  Of course not.  The problem is not the ingredient— parabens, mineral oil…. substitute your favorite controversial ingredient here.  The problem is the usage of it.  If you use an approved amount topically, that is NOT the same as eating large quantities of it.

Parabens are used extensively in foods, cosmetics, even medicine.  They serve as an antimicrobial agent as well as function as important preservatives.  Paraben safety is being studied by governmental regulatory agencies around the world, and rumors that parabens used topically in skin care and cosmetic products are harmful to our health are not supported by scientific research.

For what it’s worth, parabens are found naturally in plant sources.  Methylparaben is in blueberries.  I love a good blueberry muffin, don’t you?

Don’t let anyone scare you about the potential problems with parabens and mineral oil and the like.  Use your favorite skin care products with confidence.  If it has an ingredient you don’t understand, contact your skin care consultant.  You don’t have a skin care consultant?  No problem.  Email me at heatheramyprice@gmail.com  — I’ll be happy to help!

Heather Price of Cleveland, OH, has been a skin care and beauty consultant since August of 2000.  Have you ever wished you had a skin care program that was personalized for your needs by a personal consultant?  That’s what Heather does- she sends you home with skin care and color products that meet your specific needs.  The result is smoother, softer, younger looking skin.  Clients feel better about their appearance which gives them the self confidence they need in their lives.  You can join Heather’s email list at http://freeskincarehelp.com – she answers every email response personally.

This entry was posted on Monday, October 19th, 2009 at 9:37 am and is filed under Mineral Oil, Parabens. The entry is tagged under You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.